JUST THINKING

Author: Dale Hill

  • Whatever Became of Personal Responsibility? How We Learned to Stop Blaming Ourselves

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  • THE AI SHORTCUT: how we’re losing a generation of thinkers

    Two newsletters arrived today, and each pointed to something that has the potential to remove this country from its prominent position as a world leader.

    I returned to university at the age of 47 to complete my undergraduate degree. Non-traditional students were no longer an anomaly on campus as there was a significant population of those who did not enter college straight out of high school.

    I was floored by the mentality of the students who were in their late teens to 20’s having come straight from high school.

    We were having a great discussion in our Intercultural Communications class. Students were engaged with the topic, interacting with one another and the professor when a hand shot up in the back of the room.

    “Is this going to be on the test?”

    This one example illustrates much of what I observed during my time at university followed by my time as a Middle-School teacher a few years later.

    One of the newsletters had this significant statement—“…it concerns me that we shy away from common moral ground discussion of complex issues, defaulting to “does it work” arguments.”

    Does it work? Does it get the job done? Does it produce the results we want?

    Our educational system can be blamed for fostering this result-orientation rather than process thinking. I also include the parents in the concept of education, because many of them require teachers to basically “teach to the test.”

    Teaching to the test has been the main accusation against teachers as they prepare their students for the end-of-year assessments. There is pressure from the top down to make a good showing with these assessments, because funding is tied to them.

    However, “passing the test” has long been the goal of education.

    Let’s be fair. Assessing the attainment of knowledge is a challenging process, and testing has been the default mode for decades. Good teachers will always have “extra credit” questions on the test. These assess the thinking ability of the students and how much effort they put into the learning process. These type questions usually require that the student has put thought into the material presented, not just memorized the study guide.

    Study guides made it essentially unnecessary to learn during the class period, because the guide revealed what would be on the test. Therefore, all the student had to do was use the study guide and a good grade was probably assured. Learning is no longer the goal. Graduation is. And in order to graduate I need good grades. To get good grades all I have to do is learn the study guide.

    It doesn’t seem to matter that after graduation I still have not learned how to think, how to put together a decent sentence, or do simple computations. I graduated. (Yesterday I couldn’t even spell graduwate and today I are one.)

    Not having thinking skills is at the heart of the other newsletter. It was about AI in the classroom, and I will get to that in a moment. But first, a true-life illustration.

    I was teaching a publications class in the middle school I mentioned. As a final project, I had the students write a news story. I allowed them to either use something local as their basis or to make one up from their imagination.

    One student turned in a paper that I knew she had not written. This was before AI and it only took me about 10 minutes of searching the internet to find she had copied a news story from a newspaper in Oregan. I gave her a second chance.

    Her trying to slide by with work not her own is indirectly a result of “the grade is all that matters.” With the load that is put on teachers today, it is becoming increasingly easier to get by with that sort of cheating. Teachers haven’t the time to think deeply about the work students submit.

    Which brings up the problem of AI.

    Students are now using AI to write their papers and do their research. The problem is that there are telltale signs of an AI generated paper. Consequently, students are turning to “AI humanizers” which purportedly make the AI piece sound more human.

    Currently it is still somewhat easy to detect an AI product, but as the AI humanizers progress, it will become more difficult.

    Because AI is at the forefront of our development today, it is necessary that we begin to teach AI literacy, the same way we had to teach internet literacy a few years ago. This literacy education should not be solely about how to use AI, but also include the ethics of its use.

    Using AI to get the necessary work done short circuits the ability of thinking deeply. This will result in a retrogression of skills, which is potentially more devastating than simply getting caught using AI for the work.

    The push to “git r done” with the only required methodology of “does it work” has become endemic among those entering the workforce. Ads for AI are targeting this group with ads that say things like, “My boss thinks I’m a superstar” or, “Get more work done than others in your office.”

    What can be done?

    There are no easy answers to this insidious attack on the American work ethic. However, if it is not addressed and solved, we are on a downward spiral from the top of the heap. Our leadership of nations will soon be only of historical mention.

    One area where we could start to influence a new generation is the classroom. Instead of assigning “work-at-home” projects, move everything to in-class assignments. Yes, this will require shorter essays, but they will be essays for which the student had to think.

    That in itself is a gain.

    FULL DISCLOSURE:

    I wrote the above article myself using my own thinking and the resources mentioned to spur those thoughts.

    However, I have never been good at titles for my work. My editors always changed my headline for my articles.

    I submitted this article to AI to help generate a title. Out of the 12 possibilities given, I chose the one above.

    So, yes. While decrying the use of AI and its short-circuiting the thinking process, I resorted to AI because I can’t think of a good title.

  • Pills Can’t Cure What Lifestyle Created

    The Artificial Everything:
    How We Traded Health for Convenience

    Decades ago someone noted that evening television was mainly a medicine show. Has anything changed since then?

    I don’t get to watch evening tv anymore—haven’t in almost 10 years—so I don’t truly know the current state of affairs with the advertising industry.

    However, I do spend my evenings watching something—a movie, an original series, sports—and I am bombarded with ads for medicines to cure things I’ve never heard of.

    There are, of course, the occasional ads for cars and fast food restaurants; but by and large, medicine tops the advertising interruptions. Many of them are cheaply done and are actually laughable in their presentation.

    This fact makes me wonder about the state of the ad-writing industry.

    When I was pursuing my journalism degree from ’94-’98, there were also those who were pursuing a degree in advertising. Most of those students hated the writing classes which were required. And now it shows.

    Don’t get me wrong, journalism has not fared much better.

    I got out of journalism shortly before the plane crash over New York because the tail fell off the plane. The Associated Press headline read “TALE SECTION FALLS OFF PLANE.” That kind of typo should never get past the writer’s desk, let alone the editor’s.

    I knew then we were doomed to consuming and vaunting ignorance as a staple from the news industry. Currently, I’ve yet to be proven wrong.

    This medicine show, however, has elevated the population to a place of pill-dependency that appears to be irreversible.

    From my perspective, the new medicines are coming out faster than Taylor Sheridan’s launching of a new series. Are these medicines being tested?

    Almost everyone of them have a listing of side-effects which the ad is required to announce. Consequently, the listing lasts longer than the actual promotion.

    What floors me is how many of these list “possible death” as a side effect.

    “Yes, doctor. I don’t care if this kills me tomorrow, I want rid of the pain today. Gimme the pill.”

    We’ve also multiplied the number of pills and shots to help us get rid of weight. Coupled with that, there is also a plethora of supplements to help with whatever change you want to make in your overall health.

    I don’t think anyone would argue with the fact that overweight and obesity has become a huge problem in American society. I’m sure the factors are many, but most are easily changed.

    But, change is not what we want to do. We want someone or something to make the change for me. Therefore, the rise in the supplement industry.

    Apparently we have forgotten—or maybe the generation after mine—was not taught that nutrition is the basic building block of good health.

    However, in the same way that we have resorted to sound-bite information, we have taken on the idea that just a little tweak in my diet will fix my problems.

    We were told that sugar was bad for us. Therefore, the industry gave us artificial sweeteners. Soon, artificial sweeteners began to dominate our food choices and we opted for “lite.”

    Since the new fake sugar was approved by the FDA, there was no way it could hurt us. Joy, oh, joy!! Put that stuff in everything!

    I’m not a fan of junk food—though I eat my share of it—but one thing I cannot tolerate is artificial junk food. Diet sodas and sugar-free candies are the worst thing to put in your body.

    Yet, I see and know people with health problems that continue to follow this lemming-like parade. Have you ever noticed how many pink packets of sweetener are used by a diabetic to sweeten their tea or coffee? Astounding.

    My mother was addicted to a particular diet soda and began to have cognition problems, which the doctor said was a direct result of the sodas. He found that the capillaries in her brain were bursting and leaking.

    Modern research has found that high consumption of artificial sweeteners (e.g., aspartame, sucralose, erythritol) is linked to brain fog, cognitive decline, and memory issues, with studies showing a 62% faster cognitive decline in high-consumers. These compounds may cause neuroinflammation, disrupt neurotransmitters, and act as chemical stressors. Symptoms often include decreased focus, memory impairment, and mental sluggishness. 

    Here’s the problem: the word “high”. Without a specific amount, people will respond with, “I don’t use that much.”

    Back in the late ‘70s I was teaching a class about nutrition, and we got to the issue of sugar. A 23-year-old man exclaimed, “I don’t eat that much sugar. I have a Pepsi and Ding-Dong every morning for breakfast and there’s nothing wrong with me.”

    At 23, he did not have a single natural tooth in his head, but sugar hadn’t hurt him.

    It is that kind of a mentality which causes the despair I feel about our ever waking up form our stupor about most anything.

    As I write this (1/2026), pro-biotics are all the rage. They are advertised profusely. We are told they are essential for a healthy gut, which they are.

    However, without a lifestyle change they have about the same effect as the vitamins we take for better health. They only result in having an expensive pee.

    The good bacteria of the probiotics are compromised and destroyed by the processed foods which people have become dependent on. Therefore, their attempt at health is an exercise in futility.

    Speaking of exercise, almost all the ads for controlling weight and/or diabetes have “along with diet and exercise” somewhere in the promotion. But, that is not what we are after. That requires a change in my behavior and I am comfortable with the life I’m living. Just fix my pain.

    There is a megalithic industry out there trying to do just that. And with each new pain comes a new pill—when all that is needed in most cases is a change in diet.

    BOTTOM LINE.

    If we would first try to understand how we got in the condition we are in, we would find that it would be much cheaper to make the necessary changes.

    When the cause is understood, a change in lifestyle will often bring a cure for the pain.

    ______________________________________________

    This article appeared in my inbox two hours after I posted this blog. It is a long read, but it verifies and amplifies–with research–what I said. Well worth your time if you are interested in yours or someone else’s health.

    https://justinmares.substack.com/p/the-great-american-poisoning?utm_campaign=HL-NL-2026-01-27&utm_content=link-2&utm_medium=email&utm_source=homesteadliving-newsletter&ck_subscriber_id=2314007246

  • The Rise of Gender Confusion: A Critique of Modern Society

    We are entering an age of nonsense. If this continues, we will all become confused idiots, unable to make sense out of anything we see or hear.

    I first went to California in June of 1998. My host gave me the dime tour of San Francisco, which I thoroughly enjoyed. However, there was one disconcerting moment.

    I had been divorced for four years at the time and was certainly “on the prowl.” As we were driving through one section of the downtown area, I remarked, “Wow! There certainly are a lot of women here.” To which my host responded, “They’re probably not all women, Dale.”

    That wasn’t my first introduction to drag queens, but the event began to change things for me.

    Now, 30 years later, I am seeing the results of a twisted society.

    I am not blind nor ignorant of the fact that homosexuality and drag queens have always been a part of human society—probably since the beginning of time. However, for that part of society to gain the upper hand of controlling how the rest of society must speak and view reality is a new phenomenon and quite disconcerting.

    I recall hearing decades ago that whenever a group begins calling for equality, their eventual goal is dominion. To that place we have arrived in 2026.

    Much of this is due to the unrivaled influence of the transgender movement. Yet, let’s consider this movement through numbers before we look at their influence.

    According to the Williams Institute School of Law at UCLA, “Approximately 2.8 million people aged 13 and older—1.0% of the U.S. population in that age group—identify as transgender, according to new estimates from the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law. This includes about 724,000 youth aged 13 to 17 (3.3% of youth) and around 2.1 million adults aged 18 and older (0.8% of adults).” (https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/press/trans-pop-estimates-press-release/)

    Even though the article claims a 1% population of the United States to be transgender, it is actually less than that. The 2020 Census calculated 331 million people as residents of the USA. Regardless, the transgender population is such a small percentage of society it is remarkable that they are able to dictate to the majority how we are to relate to them.

    That requirement has now been encoded into our statutory law so that if I fail to address someone according to their preferred whim of the moment, I could be held accountable for some sort of crime. I wasn’t amiss with my observation in San Francisco, but I would be remiss if I referred to someone as a man even though he was dressed as a woman flashing his penis.

    Hypothetical ridiculous hyperbole? Maybe. But not nearly as ludicrous as the recommended guidelines for education of medical students espoused by the American Medical Association (AMA).

    Richard Dawkins, renowned intellectual and avowed atheist, wrote that being able to choose your own gender is “a doctrine that has become highly influential. The American Medical Association in 2023 laid down some “Best practices for sex and gender diversity in medical education.” Medical students are to be taught that both sex and gender are “social constructed”. And, “It is appropriate to affirm each individual’s self-determination regarding both sex and gender labels.” (https://richarddawkins.substack.com/p/is-the-male-female-divide-a-social)

    Sex and gender are social constructs?

    The argument of “socially constructed” is being used to deny reality and to make whatever I think the only truth that matters. This argument is specious at best.

    There are social constructs with which everyone agrees as to their meaning—money for example. The small rectangular piece of paper with the number 1 on it represents an agreed upon value. It has no intrinsic value of its own like a bar of chocolate the same size.

    While we are probably not going to change the rhetoric anytime soon, we should be aware of how institutions like the AMA are leading us—as if we were lemmings—over the cliff to our own destruction.

    In affirming “each individual’s self-determination”, how is the transgender individual to be treated for medical conditions? The AMA doesn’t get into that, but if students are to follow the guidelines, then when a human comes into the office with a penis attached since birth and wants to know why their menstrual cycles have never arrived, how should the doctor treat that human? What drugs can possibly be recommended?

    If this nonsense continues, the medical profession will soon be out of business due to the numerous lawsuits aimed at their incompetence.

    However, the true incompetence lies with the lawmakers who have catered to this insanity.